New Chicks and Microgreens
Daily Life At ‘The Living Workshop’
note: Not quite sure what I should be doing here. If my writing should be going to up here or instead down at the bottom below the photos. Oh well- we will figure it out eventually.
Photos down below.
The rain has come here in Maine instead of snow. We are in the thaw as we approach the Spring Equinox. And with that, the feeling moving through us that it is time to get moving on those life giving processes. Getting together a garden plan, setting up some microgreens, and picking up some new chicks to add to the growing flock.
I’m glad I got this website up and built- even if it’s not quite where I would like it to be, and put together using the ‘dreaded’ Ai. But here’s the god honest truth- if it’s between not having a website up for the season and having one up and getting flack for it- I’ll take the flack. Because it’s not something in my wheelhouse. I tend to take my wintertimes and work on learning more about computer-like things, and this was the task for the winter. My hope is to eventually be able to pay someone to go over this and spruce it up, put a more human touch to it, someone whose artistic spirit moves through the digital medium. Mine does not.
Anyways, back to the new life at the Living Workshop.
We have Arugula, Spicy Radish, and Red Beet seeds to try from High Mowing Organic Seeds. My lovely partner Jenn purchased them along with the ProMix for the growing medium. Last season I used Coco Coir- which worked well- and also had the added benefit of being able to double used for the compost worm bedding. But the taste of the microgreens was a bit too bitter, Jenn said, and as she’s the nutrionist, cook and has a palate that doesn’t just go “yum” or “yuck” like mine does. So we’ll go with what she says.
We will still get double use out of the Promix. We can let the chicken peck through and eat all the roots and left overs after harvest. and then just toss it into the garden beds to build up the organic material for the season.
That’s one of the amazing things about building and minicking natural systems. Nothing ever goes to waste. One part just feed another. So simply and elegantly- just like how good ol’ Mother Nature does. She really is the best designer, we’re all just students taking notes.
The chicks are growing up nicely. We keep them inside- actually right below where the microgreens will be growing. We reused an old dog cage we used when Owlsey was a puppy. We got it at the Thrift store in the next town over, it is a thrift store and animal shelter- where the money from the thrift store goes directly to the animal shelter. Makes it easy to ’round up’ on purchases. As well as really feel like one’s spending is going towards a worthwhile cause- not to some corporate overlords sucking the soul and money out of all the communities around. – Excuse me, can’t help myself sometimes with that.
Anyways, we repurposed the dog cage and the gals will hang out here inside with us. We’ll spend time with them and get them used to us. Even Owsley is curious and making friends with them. He has a small yellow squeeky toy called “chicklet” that he presses when he wants to play – and I think he thinks these chicks are more developed forms of chicklet. It’s cute watching him put his head in their cage and come running when he hears one squacking like they are in danger. Most of the time they’ve just fallen out of the cage and can’t find their way back in. Still- Owsley is there to investigate.
Jenn built a stair set/ramp with the extra fire wood from the wood stove for them to hang out on as well. It works really well, as well as keeping all their little poops on there instead of on the floor for cleaning. Then we can just pick up the logs and throw them in the fireplace. Easy. Simple. Effective.
We’ve got more eggs than one family can eat- which is a problem I don’t mind having. I like having excess eggs. It give me the abilty to find people to give them away to. Nice gifts to share with others. A surplus that can’t and shouldn’t be stored. The business minded would tell me that we ‘need to be selling those things’ and “customers would pay a lot for cage free eggs”(especially the way Jenn feeds them, they eat as well as we do) And maybe at some point we will do that. Go to a farmers market and sell them. Yes yes yes. Money money money. I know.
But for now I simply like the act of having something valuable that we can freely give to our friends and neighbors. Something to be able to share- because we simply have too much. It’s a nice feeling to have. Because now they are simply eggs. A nutritious food source that we can freely give away because there will be more coming tomorrow.
They aren’t a product. A money maker. A SKU number. Something to be tracked and priced and taxed and put into a spreadsheet.
They’re just eggs. They come out of a chicken just because that’s what chickens do. And I like to think that we just share them with others- because that’s just what humans do.
Oh right – I took photos of the Reishi sculpture that I’ve been working on (growing? Tending to? This process tends to allude the normal language of classifying- maybe that’s why I like it so much).
The process was this- I 3D printed this grey vase. Then I filled it with MycoMaterials- which is a mix of agricultural waste, hardwood sawdust and Reishi grain spawn- and place it into a container that will hold the moisture as well as allow it to breath as it grows. Then at some point once it the mix has had enough time to properly myceliate and hold together the medium – the 3D printed form is removed which allows the mushroom to fully myceliate the rest of the medium.
Then It starts to create it’s harder skin(it is ganoderma lucidum – ganoderma in Latin meaning ‘shiny skin’) all around where the air meets the soft white mycelium. After that it will begin to fruit- as you can see the orange and white ‘tendrils’ coming out- that’s the fruiting body of the reishi.
I will keep it growing in my makeshift display/ containment vessel I augmented from a doll case until it starts to slow down. Then I will pull it out- place it next to my wood stove and let it dry. Only then will the piece be completed – if such a thing can happen to a living piece of art. The art is the entire process of its growth- that is the real beauty – the growth, the change, the development over weeks as the mycelium grows. And I have very little part of that. I’m simply stewarding the process.
Part of me worries that I should be documenting this whole process- that I should be putting up a time lapse camera and taking all these progress photos so that I put it up on the internet so that everyone can see it. And maybe at some point I will do that. Most likely when I can find someone who can help me with that.
Because I would much prefer it to be somewhere where peoples eyes actually interact with it. Where people get to get up close to it and interact with it. Because very similar to taking a photo of a sunset or the full moon- nature doesn’t seem to like to translate to the 1’s and 0’s world of the digital world. Photos just don’t seem to do these things justice.
There are somethings that can only be properly experienced in person.
In the moment.
In real life.
And I am grateful for that.
Because it shows that there is still mystery in the world. And that there are something that resist encapsulation in the digital world.
But what do I know? I’m just a wyrd guy growing mushroom art in the forest.
Awen
www.the-living-workshop.com
This is a must-read, very profound essay, written with humor by Mark Twain.
Take some time when you can, read with friends - so fun and meaningful.
#morals #ethics #philosophy #MarkTwain #animals #human
https://thevegantruth.blogspot.com/2026/02/the-lowest-animal-profound-essay-by.html
Most people surely think of introspection and self-reflection as good qualities — things that help prevent you from making the same mistakes over and again. "The unexamined life is not worth living," said Socrates in around 399 BCE. But tech billionaire Marc Andreessen thinks he knows better. In a podcast interview with David Senra that has caused a stir today, he said his level of introspection is zero. "Move forward. Go ... I've just I found people who dwell in the past get stuck in the past ... It's a problem at work and it's a problem at home," he said. "You probably know if you go back 100 years ago, it never it never would have occurred to anybody to be introspective," he continued, perhaps forgetting about Socrates. Here's the full podcast interview.
"One way you can really tell a journalist from any knucklehead creating media content is the answer to a simple question: Are they following a Code of Ethics?"
The Society of Professional Journalists is revising its code. @Edeggans
explains why, and how you can have input, whether or not you're a journalist.
L o p e r (n) a t i o n
S i d e d
T w/
I n
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L f
S he r
S e l f Z e r 0 n e
Opera operation nation rat i o lop s id e d t w/ in it elf S he r self Zer 0 n e
#poem #poetry #individuality #authenticity #sovereignty #tolerance #reconciliation #letterlab #source #zero #writing #letterportals #wordpuzzles #programming #perception #encryption #code #polarity #one #unity #binity #trinity #quadrinity #singularity #duality #ternity #quaternity #p01 #fediverse #exquisitesocial
#reason #balance #ratio #realmen #realman #realhuman #reallyman #reallyhuman #self #accountability #responsibility #integrity #dignity #decency #honor #respect
“can't you just put a line of code or a categorizer or whatever the term of art is? It says, when someone high up in the US government tells you something, assume what they're telling you is lawful and virtuous, and you're done.
No. Because the models are too smart for that. If you give them that simple rule, they don't just deterministically follow that.
When you do these high level simplistic rules, it tends to degrade performance.”
From The Ezra Klein Show: Why the Pentagon Wants to Destroy Anthropic, Mar 6, 2026
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-ezra-klein-show/id1548604447?i=1000753535576&r=2255
Today I learned how to sidechain effects for a single drum within the Redrum kit inside Reason 12.
Simple, can't believe I waited so long to check it out.
This software really brings out my inner child, who apparently is very much like Gene Belcher...
https://on.soundcloud.com/EYFr7qYSERIYop6GEr
#ImadeThis #music #Reason #simple #noAI #guitar #bass #electronicDrums #creativeCommons #bobsBurgers
#Bunnings Windsor Gardens has a lot to learn about customer service..
This morning, american accent girl "serving" couldn't even be bothered to acknowledge existence:
Me: "Hello"
Her: "Flybuys?" [Turns back to her coworker and continues chatting with him]
Me: "No, Hello..."
Her: "Cash or Card?" [Turns back to her coworker and continues chatting with him]
Me: "Card"
Her: [Shoves card reader towards me while continuing chatting with her coworker]
Her: [Hands receipt to me while continuing chatting with her coworker]
I don't care if your worker has the "major hots" for the guy working next to her, when you're serving a customer acknowledge and serve them.
I've just been writing about "Vertigo: The Rise and Fall of Weimar Germany" by Harald Jähnner.
One author discussed there is Helmuth Plessner, with a focus on his 1924 "Grenzen der Gemeinschaft" (Limits of Community).
Katja Haustein wrote about Plessner in a TLS review (24/4/20) of his "Political Anthropology":
>>In Political Anthropology (Macht und menschliche Natur), written in 1931, Plessner discusses the anthropological origins of the human tendency to give in to authoritarian forms of government. Closely linked to his earlier and more accessible essay, The Limits of Community (1924), the book reads as a passionate warning against the rise of social and political radicalism that so exhausted the Weimar Republic. Much of Plessner's argument is based on what Richard Sennett has called the "tyrannies of intimacy". Plessner claimed that the central problem of modern subjectivity was not a growing distance between individuals, but, on the contrary, its disappearance. He curbed widespread expectations that promote politicized conceptions of community (Gemeinschaft) as a space in which alienation would dissolve. He attacked the idealization of a "seamless togetherness" tainted by nationalist colours, and defended the idea of society (Gesellschaft) as a space in which distance affords man his dignity. <<
I've got to read some Plessner!
Image: Wikipedia
#HelmuthPlessner #Philosophy #SocialTheory #Germany #WeimarRepublic
There can be only one nudist creators and influencers battle for subscribers
There can be only one nudist creators and influencers battle for subscribers
That was the premise of the Highlander movies and TV series. A group of immortals battle each other through time to be that one. Each time a foe is vanquished the victor gathers that energy and moves closer to being the one. A similar battle seems to be shaping up among a group of folks online, who describe themselves as nudist creators or naturist influencers. The primary activity provided by these creators are videos of themselves naked which are available only to their subscribers for a fee. Some provide videos of them doing everyday, tasks others show walks in the woods or time at the beach. Other just talk to the camera, and yet other present risqué and erotic material alongside naturist activity. The common theme is nudity and the cause of normalizing nudity.
Remember the days when naturist wrote books and the naturist fiction genre tried to get acceptance in literary circle. Now with a video camera or just the camera on your phone and a naked body or bodies the nudist creators asks that you pay to see them naked in their efforts to normalize nudity, promote body positivity and any other number of slogan which are associated with online money transfer for viewing rights. This pay per view nudity isn’t exactly new we wrote about the coming of this phenomenon two years ago. Video presentation platforms have advanced, social media censorship has increased and camera phones have gotten better, now there are a host of people who are battling for status as a "nudist" to be the one.
Who will be the one? nudist creators and influencers battle for subscribers
In the movie THE One starring Jet Li there is a multiverse (one is created every time a black hole implodes) where people who are identical live there lives oblivious to their other verse counterparts. Until one of the them realizes that every time one is killed their energy is transferred to an other verse counterpart making them stronger and more powerful. One man for one universe is determined to be THE One. The one with all the energy and all the power, and sets out to rid the multiverse of everyone else. Throughout the movie he boldly states "I will be the one" something similar seems to be emerging among naturists/nudists online.
The glut of online "nudist" creators asking for support for their Patreon accounts, seems like a multiverse of pay per view nudity creators each one asking their subscribers to make them the one. It is similar to the all new streaming services that want you and me to pay for their streaming content. Netflix used to be the one but now Peacock, Disney+ HBOMax, CBS All Access everyone want you to subscribe to their streaming service. Not to mention Epix, STARZ many other second tier services. The pundits in the video on demand world say there just isn’t room for everyone video. Most people can only afford to subscribe to one or two. Similarly in the end most people are only likely to support one or two nudist creators. What happens with others? Where does all their energy go where does their expression of ordinary naturist life live?
https://twitter.com/love2travelnude/status/1326707781227974656
If this trend continues it may lead to a splinteringof the naturist community at a time when we are losing steam for in person social gatherings. Even in Europe where greater freedoms exist the trend toward less in person on more online interaction driven in no small part by the covid 19 virus is increasing. This is another instance where social media may actually make people less sociable.
https://twitter.com/naked5k/status/1327682151622594561
As much as we love and use technology the visceral response to just posing the question suggestion a splintering of community that one was a feature of in person social naturism may be moving online.
https://twitter.com/liveclothesfree/status/1327686956831092737
Nudist creators and influencers battle for subscribers Is that good?
In this writers opinion we would do well to consider if this will detrimental to the future of naturist community online and in person and not simple rush headlong into normalizing this trend. The trend raises some significant questions for the future of naturism and nudism particularly online. Bare your thoughts on these questions" If in the future the promotion of naturism exists only behind a paywall, will that actually expand the appeal and reach more people? Does the pay per view nudity model further reinforce the association with the porn industry? Why does it seem that the majority of the folks operating behind per per view service always seem to end up providing content of a sexual nature alongside their "nudist" or "naturist" content? Are their better ways to use the technology and support creators? Does having to choose create a cult of personality that limits us to the experience and expression of naturism and nudism to those people we support or like?
Who will be the one? Will there really only be one? These questions remain to be answered. Just as the future is uncertain for all the new streaming services the future is uncertain for all the new nudist creators and naturist influencers. History may be able to teach us something in the impact of Ilsley Boone'hold on American nudism and what happened when he was THE ONE. But then again maybe not since many don’t really know or pay attention to history these day. What do you think bare your thoughts in the comments below.